((OOC: The song is Frontline, by the band Pillar))

"♪Everybody with their fists raised high,
Let me hear your battle cry tonight,♪"

"Ryan... Wake up."

"♪Stand aside or step aside,
For the Frontlines!"

"Mister Sin... Wake up now." A very soft voice broke through the blasting music that encased Ryan's ears.

'That's weird... Must be part of my dream...' Ryan let the voice slip in one ear and out the other. He was enjoying this little nap WAY too much to wake up now.

"♪And we'll be carrying on until the day
it doesn't matter anymore,
Step aside you forgot what this is for,♪"

"Mister Sin, I SUGGEST you wake up immediately, or I may be forced to take action!" The voice was a little louder this time, and sounded slightly angrier.

"♪We fight to live, we live to fight,
and tonight you'll hear my battle cry♪"

"MISTER SIN!" The sound of a ruler cracking on the desk next to his head made Ryan jump into consciousness. He looked around in a sort of daze as he tried to find the source of the noise. He looked down at his desk to see that, as he suspected, a ruler had been slapped down a few inches from where his nose had been. Following the hand holding the ruler, he looked directly into the face of his seventh period teacher. He hurriedly pulled the headphones out of his ears and tried (failed) to hide them inconspicuously. He then smiled innocently back at his teacher.

"Yes ma'am?" His smile slowly faded in the face of his teachers infamous death-stare.

"Ryan, I could care less about the headphones, but you really need to keep the music turned down so you can hear the bell. It rang three minutes ago." She crossed her arms and tapped her foot. Ryan looked at the clock and, upon the realization that she was right, rushed to gather his things. He successfully stayed awake through all of eighth period.

"No work today, no work today, I'm so happy!" Ryan sang to himself as he was walking through the school parking lot. His Nissan Skyline was easily the most noticeable vehicle there, with the switch-blade doors and pearlescent coating that had earned Ryan the envy of ALL of his peers at the school. His parents had gifted it to him for his sixteenth birthday. His father was an international businessman, and claimed that the cost was 'no great matter for the son he rarely saw.' His mother, who worked more locally, had payed for the incredible stereo system that Ryan considered the greatest part of the car. Overall, Ryan was amazed the beauty hadn't been keyed out of pure jealousy yet.

He went straight home and rushed to his room. First, he opened up Windows Media Player and started up his music. Then, he slipped on the headset, opened up the World, and waited for the login screen to come up.

He appeared in Mac Anu, the first server, and took some time to look around before beginning his first dungeon dive.

((Nowhere NEAR completed. This post DID have a purpose, in that I introduced the song that I'm going to use as the theme for this quest. I'm going to use songs to set the mood for my quests. Good idea, right? Also, it serves to give a little insight into his personal life.))

((Yay... Getting the chance to follow up.))

Mac Anu was such a peaceful place. The river running through the center of the town, the cool-toned coloration of nearly everything in sight. The shopkeepers stood gruffly watching everyone that passed. It all promoted the sense of security, the knowledge that one could rest here without worry.

Loki wanted to leave this place as soon as possible. It didn't quite suit him. He turned on his heel and looked up at the chaos gate. The large, circular, golden rim with runes wrapping their way around was, most certainly, intimidating. The runes seemed to shift, as if challenging the watcher to step through into the world beyond.

"Let's see... Where do I want to go for my first dive?" Loki muttered aloud to himself. The keyword menu appeared before him, revealing a list of various keywords and their respective effects.

"Well... This sounds menacing." He chose three keywords and closed the menu. Loki again looked up at the gate.

"Putrid

Corrupted

Nothingness"

He warped out of Mac Anu, and into the chaotic world beyond...

"Okay, where did I send myself?" When he finally ended up in the field, Loki had to take a second to adjust his eyes to the darkness. It was a nighttime field, the sky completely covered in clouds as though about to rain. The ground was broken, what little vegetation existed was rotting.

Upon looking around at his surroundings, Loki made the discovery of a large golden gate, similar to that of the chaos gate. He approached it with caution, knowing better than most new players that when one knows little, one must always observe caution around the unknown.

He came within range, and the gate seemed to explode with activity. The rings floating around it spun with incredible speed, and the inner circle shrank into nothing. When all had vanished, in the gate's place stood a small creature. Loki watched this creature as it stood still for a few seconds, seemingly watching Loki as well.

Then it rushed. When it came within the range of Loki's twin blades, he could observe that this creature was a goblin. It was level 1, with low health, and no resistances. This creature was weak and, despite the menacing nature of the area's appearance, so too was the field. The goblins attacks did little damage, and as such Loki was able to quickly dispatch the nuisance without a second thought.

Two similar battles later, during one of which Loki had fought two goblins at once, he found himself standing at one of the most terrifying things he'd ever seen. The upper half of some creature's head stuck out of the ground, it's teeth blocking off all but one small path into the throat of the enormous beast. Partially unburied fingers clawed at the air and ground, as if attempting to dig the creature out. Upon closer observation and a quick peek at the field map, Loki found that this was the entrance to the dungeon of the area.

"Ah, well... I suppose I'll have to enter, then. Into the belly of the beast I go..." Loki stepped between the gap in the creatures teeth and followed the throat to the first floor of the dungeon.